Hardware Startup Resources

If you want to build your product in Asia, you need to know the manufacturing process inside out. And, if you lack this knowledge, you need a partner who ensures that you are never without the information you require. What follows are the areas where the companies we work with most frequently require help in Asia. As you will see, contract manufacturing risks begin in the earliest stages of design, and extend to the management of contract manufacturer (CM) relationships even after your product is on the market. 1. Consider […]

The new Shopify and JD.com partnership is exciting news for Shopify merchants.  The partnership deal makes the challenges of selling goods to the Chinese market much easier. Shopify merchants can add the official JD.com app from the Shopify Marketplace and begin selling to Chinese customers in under four weeks. Here is what you need to know to get started selling on JD.com:

Having worked with thousands of inventors, hardware startups, and large corporations over the course of 30 years, you can say at Design 1st that we’ve seen it all. We love to see our customers succeed but we have also witnessed many disappointments due to manufacturing missteps. The reasons differ from company to company, but certain themes always come up. Below is a list of common reasons we see new hardware products fail. Creating a design that cannot be manufactured Making the wrong type of prototype Failing to control the Product […]

How will you fund your next hardware project? Funding is critical to the success of any new physical product development project. It’s one of the key ingredients on top of a great idea, a talented team, and a tight product-market fit that every company needs to push forward to market.   Physical product development is a cash flow business, necessary to get to market, manufacture, ship to customers, and scale your sales. Over 25 years, Design 1st has seen 1000+ physical product development projects move from concept to manufacturing. Each of these projects navigated funding challenges.    To help […]

The first wave of new cannabis tech hardware is here. New cannabis tech products are flooding the marketplace filling brand new category niches that have never been explored. These devices include medicinal humidors, THC breathalyzers, cannabis flower analysis, metered dosing devices — plus many more. Check-out the top 10 cannabis devices making waves right now:

Cannabis legalization in regions across the world is igniting demand for new cannabis tech hardware devices. The result? A flurry of R&D activity as entrepreneurs and corporations race to bring new hardware to market. The most popular of these new cannabis devices are vaporizers that work by heating up marijuna flower, oil or extracts into a vapor that can be consumed. Right now dozens of companies across the world are racing to bring new cannabis vaporizer technology to market. Here are three reasons why: